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When I think of the mass killings on campuses and the hijackings that led to the killing of thousands of innocents on 9/11, it occurs to me how differently things might have turned out if a few civilians had been armed when the sh*t went down. I don't think banning guns accomplishes much more than leaving them ONLY in the hands of the people we don't think should have them and the authorities, who so frequently don't show up in time to make a difference.

You really think people should be free to carry guns on aircraft in the USA ??? Keep in mind the large proportion of americans on medications including psychiatric drugs and that on top of it the airlines plying their passengers with booze while squeezing them into ever less leg room while crammed into metal tubes with shitty air quality and staff bent out of shape by constant talk of terrorists.

I think weapons and potential weapons get on every single commercial flight as is. I think you're suffering from a false sense of security if you think a plane can't be hijacked without a gun. And terrorists will get guns on planes if they want to anyway, if only by getting confederates hired into airport and airline staff.

Or if a civilian had been armed. There are probably a couple or a few police officers or soldiers on any flight. If they are trusted with weapons on the ground, why not in the air? If it was dead certain a few guns were on board every plane, would a terrorist even attempt a hijacking?

The Bill of rights did not come out of nowhere. They were already part of the Articles of Confederation (Google it). Some of the states insisted these rights be retained if they were to vote for ratification of the Constitution. The Articles specifically stated that the guns were to be kept in a common storehouse. The mistake the framers made when they transferred these laws to the Constitution was that they also abbreviated them, since they assumed that all Americans knew exactly what they were. The former colonists simply wanted to be able gather at the local storehouse and get out their squirrel rifles (no AK47's in those days), and prepare to meet an attacking enemy. The "right to bear arms" had already been part of the A of C because people did not want a repeat of what the British government had done, which was to prohibit colonists from legally having access to weapons. But what the NRA doesn't tell you is that, in the A of C, it was explicit that the weapons had to be kept in a common, locked, armory. They DID NOT give individual colonists the right to own personal firearms. They didn't prohibit it, either, of course, but that is not the point. The point is that, when the 2nd Amendment includes the clause, "A well-regulated militia..." it means EXACTLY that, despite the twisted interpretation the NRA tries to put on it. The immensely wealthy NRA and its lackeys in Congress NEVER quote the entire amendment, because they don't want the average citizen to be aware of it if they can help it. The Second Amendment was never intended to address the issue of personal ownership of weapons; it was meant only to make certain that the government could not legally prevent citizens from having access to them in the event they wished to form a militia to defend the colony or state.

Of course, the right wing-dominated, ACTIVIST Supreme Court couldn't wait to accede to the wishes of the NRA, just like the entire Republican Party. The NRA, though, does NOT exist for the protection of the right of citizens to own weapons; it exists for the sole purpose of making certain that the weapons and ammunition industry will be able to continue to make huge profits by making sure that anybody and everybody, criminals included, will be able to buy all the guns and ammo they can afford. That's what unregulated gun shows are for. Do the math: the more Americans who die from handguns, the more money the guns & ammo industry makes; and the NRA exists for the sole purpose of organizing to make sure that never will change.

Aside from the legal arguments, the fact remains that more people are killed by guns in the U.S. than all the other countries combined. USA! USA! USA! Ten times the number of Americans are killed by guns than any other country. Our nearest neighbor to the north can count their total annual gun deaths in the single digits. In short, all CIVILIZED countries prohibit individual citizens from owning handguns. All CIVILIZED countries have crime rates FAR lower than ours. All CIVILIZED countries abhor the idea of their citizens gunning each other down, willy-nilly. Americans on the other hand idolize the gun-totin' denizens of the mythical, UNcivilized, old west. Most American males imagine themselves as Wyatt Earp, or even the psychopathic killer, Jesse James. Other countries don't do that; they are CIVILIZED, don't you see?

Conservatives and NRA gun-suckers HATE Michael Moore, because he inadvertently got Charlton Heston to tell the truth. He simply asked Heston why he thought so many more Americans are killed with guns than all the other countries, Heston mumbled something about the culture that CLEARLY revealed what he meant: that America has too many black and Hispanic folks in it. And Moore didn't put those words in his mouth; they came out of his racist head. What else could he have meant? That is a rhetorical question, of course; he meant what he said. Further, the sub-text here is that many white Americans imagine that blacks and Mexicans are just waiting to attack them in their beds and they must therefore keep a gun under the pillow to feel secure. In short: they are COWARDS, cowering with loaded guns under their pillows, despite the danger of that gun to their own families. I grew up in South Central L.A., dead in the center of Crips territory, but it never even occurred to me or my family to have guns to protect ourselves. My father, a lawman himself, never even used his gun to capture a lawbreaker. He was the bravest man I ever knew, and he didn't need a gun to feel powerful.

Another reason for American attitudes towards guns is having been raised on western movies. There is a myth that the true American hero must tote a gun to be a real man, just like Hopalong Cassidy. The truth is very different. In the year 1910, there were a total of 213 homicides in the entire United States (Look it up!). At that time, very few Americans owned handguns. It is not a coincidence that it was around 1910 when movies, including western movies, gangster movies, war movies, etc. began to be popular. Pretty soon, every male wanted his own six-shooter. Since then, the murder rate has gone up (skyrocketed, actually) as the proliferation of weapons has gone up; it's not rocket science to understand that.

And it's not about to ever change. Americans, by and large don't really care. If there were ten million Americans killed with guns each year, Americans STILL wouldn't care; at least the Republicans wouldn't. The NRA keeps telling them; and now the Supreme Court is telling them that they can have all the weapons they want - that it's actually PATRIOTIC to own guns. And we have the country's largest quasi-criminal organization, the NRA, making sure that street thugs can easily buy their guns at gun shows.

The NRA periodically frames the issue as it being necessary for citizens to own guns in case the government comes to get them. Many idiots believe this and they are a big source of revenue for gun makers. Their boast is that when the government comes to take their guns they will use those guns to prevent that from happening. Right! When the tanks are rolling down the street to take your guns, for some unimaginable reason, your handgun will protect you?

Then there is the huge lie the NRA keeps telling: that if only the laws were enforced the killings would go down. Even if that WERE true, which it isn't, approximately half of the gun deaths each year have no connection with crime; they are usually friends either getting angry and drunk and shooting their friends or relatives; or they are accidents or suicides. I once sat on a jury that convicted a man of first degree murder for shooting and killing his best friend over a perceived insult. He was drunk, of course. And in his drunken state (which is not illegal), he got out his handy pistol and killed his friend. We convicted him, by the way. If that gun had not been easily available, one man would not now be dead and the other in prison. My own cousin - a nice guy - shot and killed his wife's lover in a fit of rage. He, too, went to prison; and no stricter law enforcement would have prevented that killing. On the other hand, if he hadn't had a gun handy, he would have had more time to think about it. That's also true of suicides. Shooting oneself is the easiest, cleanest, and quickest way to do the deed. How many potential suicides would be averted if the victim had a little more time to think about it, instead of impulsively reaching out and pulling the trigger?

Every study that's ever been done shows that the odds of somebody being killed by his own gun are MANY times greater than that their gun would ever be used for self protection. Yet another anecdote: a good friend of mine, 50 years ago, pointed a 32 revolver at my face and started to pull the trigger, thinking the gun was empty. It wasn't! I stopped him just in time, and he almost fainted. I often think of all the things I've accomplished in my life that never would have happened if Fred had pulled that trigger. Tougher law enforcement wouldn't have helped.

Years ago, TIME Magazine devoted an entire issue to publishing the names, photos, and circumstances of some 700 or so (as I recall) Americans killed IN ONE WEEK by handguns. The result? The NRA and the Republicans in Congress loudly and angrily castigated TIME. They didn't claim it wasn't true. They just didn't want Americans to know about it and thought it un-American of TIME to publish it.

NRA gun nuts who read this will be outraged, of course. They claim to be against crime. But why then did they lobby strenuously to prevent Congress from outlawing armor-piercing bullets? There can be only one answer to that: they wanted cop-killers to be able to purchase that ammunition for the profit of the ammunition manufacturers. If the Mafia had done that, we would demand they be hauled off to the hoosegow. But if the NRA does it, it's okay, I guess. Why do they insist that automatic weapons should be legal when there is no reason for them except to be able to kill a lot of human beings quickly, just like the guy who shot Gabrielle Giffords? Because automatic weapons sales are big profits for the weapons industry. Why do they oppose virtually every police chief and mayor of any urban American city and instead imply that the cop on the street supports the right to carry guns. That is preposterous on its face. One of the main tactics urban police (used to) employ to control street gangs is to periodically raid homes where they thought illegal guns might be found; they could then charge those gangbangers with felonies and get them off the street. But the Supreme Court, in its Supreme wisdom has now made that very difficult, if not impossible. In most jurisdictions, it is not illegal, in itself, to belong to a gang; so the police can longer legally raid the residences of gangbangers solely on suspicion of having illegal weapons. The thugs can now have as many cop-killing weapons as they want, since the 2nd Amendment and 5 out of 9 S.C. Justices say that they are protected by the 2nd Amendment. I hardly think the average cop on the street supports that. But the NRA makes blatantly specious claims that they do. Every now and then, they trot out some hick cop from Mississippi to agree with them. But most professional police and law enforcement organizations do not. Sadly, most Americans want to believe the NRA, because Americans want to grow up to be cowboys.

Finally, NO NRA member can answer the question Michael Moore asked: Why DO Americans kill more of their own citizens with guns than any other country? The obvious answer is that we have many orders of magnitude more guns than the rest of the world - duhhhh! Road rage shootings exist only in America - something of which to be truly proud, isn't it? And don't let them get away with the lie that it's because other countries enforce their laws and Americans don't. Poppycock.

NO NRA member can answer the question Michael Moore asked: Why DO Americans kill more of their own citizens with guns than any other country?

As I recall, he answered the question in a way during the movie by comparing Detroit with its high rate of gun violence to the much less violent but otherwise comparable nearby Canadian city to the south (yes, the south). That city is Windsor, Ontario. Both cities have high rates of poverty, large minority populations, and nearly equivalent gun ownership rates, but the gun crime rate is far less in Windsor.

What's the difference? Isn't it obvious? The difference between the two cities is the difference between Canadians and Americans!

Your rhetoric is wrong on so many fronts I am unsure where to begin. Let me base my retort on the fact that I am a lifelong gun owner who grew up in a gun owning family. I can understand your bias since you stated that you were raised in the jungles of LA where life really is not well represented for the remainder of we rural Americans. A gun is a weapon first and foremost. The one that lays on my kitchen table is no better than a rock until it is picked up and aimed at a target. I'll answer your question BTW: More people in the US are killed by guns because guns are extremely effective at killing people. They beat rocks, knives, and clubs hands down. I can kill an intruder at a distance and forego good ole hand to hand combat. You have a much higher probability of success with a gun than a rock.

While it is reasonable to assume that the NRA has influence from the gun and ammo industry it is certainly incorrect to state that the National Rifle Association's members primary purpose it to keep the weapons and ammo coming. Their actual number one goal is to ensure the right to own and bear arms by the LAW-ABIDING citizens of America is not infringed or usurped. Bleeding hearts say but guns kill people and are bad! No, guns don't kill people. It takes a finger to do that.

Not all NRA members were in favor of allowing armor piercing ammo to remain available. I can personally attest to that fact.

Your metropolitan take on guns is quite different that my "in the backwoods" rural take. Weapons are an ingrained way of life here in the sticks. Their misuse is not a problem; certainly not in relation to the urban warfare of gangs where life for the other guy has little meaning.

Idiots do exist unfortunately and accidents will continue to happen. Hunters will fall and their firearm's trigger safety is not engaged. Gun 1 Idiot 0.

The impatient rage that exists in this country is not the fault of the gun. The misuse of firearms by short tempered gang bangers is a symptom of a social disease. Why blame the gun? What's the difference between killing someone with a gun or bashing their head in with a pick axe? Nothing. The tool is not at fault. The violence that pervades our society is not at it's core a gun issue. Why make the gun out to be the fall guy. Remove guns and the despicable perps will resort to other methods in their attacks on society.

I cherish my gun ownership and it provides me with a sense of security and a means to put food on my table. As a law abiding citizen I will not easily give up my rights to have them. The people that give firearms a bad name are just that, bad people. We would be better served to place our attention on the psychosis of killing others than the tool used to that end.

You might want to check those statistics and the rest of your argument more closely. I can international sources. Michael Moore did not. The U.S. is not even in the top 10 in gun misusage. Check Wikipedia.

I think that every citizen should own a gun; however, I don't think everyone born in this country should be a citizen. I think citizenship should be earned by serving your country in some form for a minimum of four years and that your citizenship should be taken away for committing violent crimes. We should all be trained on survival and military tactics. Too many people wouldn't know what to do if they were stuck in the wilderness or forced to fight for their freedom by invading forces. My roommate doesn't even know how to swim.

The fourteenth amendment throws that idea out the door but just an idea of mine. And most people don't vote anyways so they wouldn't be missing out on much by not serving their country anyways.

Compulsory military service? Appalling. Taking away peoples citizenship, sure first for violent crime, then homosexuality, then masturbation, who ever is in power will decide I'm sure. I respect your views sir, but I would never ever ever serve the military or police in any way, ever. It is wrong to hurt others and it is infinity more wrong to do so for the interests of some overhead force. I'm not a pawn I'm a person, this is my country, and I'm going to keep it.